Tag: Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources (CCAMLR)

The world's biggest marine reserve in Antarctica officially comes into effect on Friday, in what has been hailed as a watershed moment in conservation. The marine protected area in the Ross Sea curbs damaging activities such as fishing, to protect wildlife including Adelie and emperor penguins in the high seas off Antarctica.

Australia has intercepted in the Southern Ocean the fishing vessel Perlon, believed to have been operating under a false flag in defiance of international conventions, according to an official report from the Ministry of Immigration and Border Protection.

The New Zealand navy has discovered a third boat fishing illegally. The Foreign Ministry informed that the HMNZS Wellington caught another vessel, Yongding, to the west of the Ross Sea, in Antarctic waters.

The Commission for the Conservation of Antarctic Marine Living Resources (CCAMLR) has again failed to agree to protect key areas in the Ross Sea and East Antarctica at its annual meeting in Hobart due to blocking by China and Russia. The partners of the Antarctic Ocean Alliance (AOA) said that this failure to reach consensus for the fourth time calls into question CCAMLR’s ability to deliver on its conservation commitments.

The world's biggest marine reserve in Antarctica may have to be given an expiry date to get countries with interests in the prized waters to agree to it. Delegations from 25 nations are resuming in Tasmania a New Zealand-US proposal for a marine protected area (MPA) in the fish-rich Ross Sea, 3500km south of New Zealand.